Jenny Levy Honored as National Coach of the Year

In the world of college athletics, winning championships and awards typically leads to two things.

More championships. More awards.

Longtime UNC women’s lacrosse coach Jenny Levy received another reminder of that fact on Tuesday, when she was named the Division I National Coach of the Year by the Intercollegiate Women’s Lacrosse Coaches Association.

The honor comes just over a month after Levy led the Tar Heels to their second national championship in four years.

Since building the program from scratch 21 years ago, she has risen to fourth on the NCAA’s all-time coaching wins list, while taking the Tar Heels to nine Final Fours.

However, it was just second time Levy has won the Coach of the Year award.

As you might have guessed, she also took it home in 2013–following UNC’s only other national title run.

This past season, though, will be widely regarded as the best in the program’s history.

The Tar Heels went 20-2 in 2016, finished the ACC season 7-0, and closed the season on a 17-game winning streak.

In the NCAA Championship Game, Levy’s squad proved its greatness with a demolition of No. 1 Maryland–which was undefeated and on a 26-game streak that extended back to 2015.

She’ll formally pick up her award Nov. 17 at Disney’s Coronado Resorts in Florida–during the IWLCA Annual Meetings.

Also being honored that day are Florida Southern College’s Kara Reber (Division II national champion) and Middlebury College’s Kate Livesay (Division III national champion).